Animated films tend to remain relevant in many different circles long after their time in theaters. Whether they be stone-cold classics recognized by the wider public or underappreciated films that have garnered more of an audience online, many of these formative movies have stuck in our minds in many different ways. However, there is one animated franchise that feels more like an enigma than anything. It lasted for over a decade, had multiple films released in theaters, and made billions at the box office, and yet, no one talks about it. I am of course talking about the Ice Age movies.

The main animated franchise of 20th Century Fox and their animation studio Blue Sky, Ice Age is one of those things that fascinates me in just how it lasted so long and yet has had so little cultural impact. It’s not that I don’t have any memory of this series since I grew up watching the first movie consistently. It was a childhood favorite and I remember a lot about it fondly. However, looking at it broadly as a series, it just doesn’t stick in the mind aside from pointing out how absurd its longevity was. The first film was a moderate success with around a 300 million gross worldwide. The second, Ice Age: The Meltdown, doubled that and was the biggest animated hit in 2006. The third and fourth films, Dawn of the Dinosaurs and Continental Drift, both made nearly 900 million each. With a franchise like this making so much at the box office, I think there’s merit in observing this odd series by looking at why it made so much money and why it just disappeared from the public consciousness after the fact.

To set the scene though, we need to look at when these movies came out. In the 2000s, animated films were honestly bigger than ever. Pixar was releasing classic films almost every year that appealed both to kids and adults. DreamWorks had hit big with films like Shrek and Madagascar that focused more on goofy and edgy comedy that audiences felt was a welcome pallet cleanser after a decade of Disney dominance in the 90s. However, between these two giants, Blue Sky and their Ice Age movies were keeping pace even if it felt like they came and went. The first movie being a success does make logical sense in hindsight. It came out in 2002 and computer-animated movies were a huge new novelty, especially following Shrek’s massive success the previous year. A film that took a slightly similar approach with its casting and humor would likely attract a similar audience. However, as for why the sequels made so much even compared to the competition, there is an answer: the foreign market. When the second film was a smash hit, then president of 20th Century Fox Animation, Chris Meledandri, credited the global market appeal and how a lot of the film focused on imagery rather than dialogue for a lot of its storytelling. This, in my opinion, is not only why Ice Age stuck around, but why it made so much money despite the lack of apparent relevance and staying power. This can be apparent with the third and fourth films where the former made almost 700 million internationally and the latter over 700. While movies making more money internationally is usually how it goes, this is a case where the other markets outpace the domestic one heavily.

To be more specific though, I feel that two factors likely resulted in more international success for these movies. The first is that it is likely that the different dubs of these movies provided a different experience in other countries. Some animated films have been noted to have foreign dubs that both improve jokes and add ones that are funnier to that specific culture as well as casting more recognizable local celebrities. Shrek is a notable example since its Spanish dub had more references and dialogue that was specifically aimed towards Hispanics and celebrities such as Eugenio Derbez voicing characters like Donkey. Compare that to the English dubs of the Ice Age films. The domestic releases of these movies tended to focus more on stacking random then-relevant celebrities like Drake and Jessie J or keeping ones on like Ray Romano and Queen Latifia who, while very talented and still working, didn’t stay culturally relevant by the end of the 2000s and didn’t have characters who were strong enough to be distinctive or do much aside from reminding someone of the celebrity. Compare them to Tim Allen as Buzz Lightyear where the fact that he hasn’t been as relevant since the 90s isn’t an issue since the writing in the Toy Story films makes people see a character first. The English dubs also have jokes and dialogue that, while not bad, feel more standard and sitcom-like. Having a different approach in voice acting and joke writing likely resulted in more local appeal in other countries. The other and most important factor of the foreign success of these movies is the character of Scrat. Being a side character that the film cuts to in-between the main plot, he is a silent buck-toothed squirrel that goes through Wile E Coyote-style antics chasing after his acorn. Given that he is entirely silent and reliant on slapstick, he is a character whose appeal transcends language. The fact that his plots take up a huge chunk of the movies makes it likely that he was a key factor in helping these movies play better in a foreign market compared to more dialogue-heavy films. This is something that tends to happen with cartoons that focus far less on dialogue and more on voiceless slapstick such as Tom & Jerry and Roadrunner where the lack of a verbal barrier allows them to be successful anywhere.

However, as for why these movies fell out of relevance, well, there are also two factors I think are to blame. First is that these films never really created a sense of deeper identity. Films like Kung Fu Panda and Megamind were appealing when they were released because of their premises and comedy, but had deeper aspects in their themes and character journeys that more people have appreciated over the years. Aside from aspects of the first movie, the Ice Age series is mostly comedy-focused and while that isn’t a bad thing, like I stated before, the type of humor presented is more standard compared to the more rapid-paced antics of say Madagascar. Without much to remember these films by, I feel that many who watched these movies as a kid either don’t have the desire to rewatch them and that these films don’t stick around culturally either since they are basic in their concept and execution. Even a memorably bad film like Shark Tale or The Lorax will have some ironic appreciation for how it fails or will have jokes and memes made about its bad qualities. While Ice Age was never unsuccessful in America, it never became a phenomenon or beloved compared to the output of other animated studios. It’s noted that domestically, the series never cracked over 200 million and the 5th film only made around 60 million which was considered a financial disappointment. It just feels like the series only really coasted on the success it found in the international market so it just never bothered to do anything with it domestically aside from just letting it be a basic comedy that other movies could easily provide alongside much more. As such, in an era where many animated films are being looked back upon for their strengths or memorability, Ice Age’s lack of identity or really any strong elements resulted in people brushing over it.

The second and. in my opinion, the bigger reason for this film series’ disappearance, however, is that in terms of the market of theatrical animation, especially in the international areas, another studio and film series took their place as the basic animated comedy that had wide appeal. Chris Meledandri was vital in the initial years of Blue Sky, but he later left to start Illumination and that studio took the aspects of what made Ice Age successful (the foreign market appeal, focus on basic comedy, and dialogue-less aspects) and turned them up. The Despicable Me films are arguably more basic and trope-driven than the Ice Age films. However, the intense marketing campaigns, relatively lower production costs, and the fact that the minions have been inescapable for the past decade have resulted in these movies staying around. Even if you don’t like the minions, they are still something that sticks in your mind. Compared to this, the Ice Age films don’t really have anything distinctively good or memorably bad about them. It’s also the fact that the Minions do what Scrat does in terms of being something that can be imported anywhere due to a lack of a language barrier, but are far more marketable and caught on far more than the squirrel ever did. In between the time the 4th and 5th Ice Age films were released, the Despicable Me films took the world by storm and occupied the market spot those films had for years. It’s notable that while the 5th film did make more money internationally, it was far less than any of the sequels had ever done which indicates that they just lost their place at the box office in terms of what they offered. Without something that sticks out, something else that worked better in the market and appealed to a wide audience while staying relevant took its place.

Ice Age is honestly a prime example of a film series that while being successful, illustrates that financial success that isn’t everything. There are plenty of movies that have made a lot of money and yet have been virtually forgotten while films that were initial financial failures are classics today. Compare the Disney Live Action remakes to movies The Iron Giant or Labyrinth where the former feel like flash-in-the-pan chart chasers while the later examples have had their artistic ambitions be respected and remembered constantly. Hollywood does tend to double down on stuff that makes the most money and while it often results in some movies becoming cultural forces, many films just tend to exist and make money without much of an impact. It’s a shame that both this series and its studio were stuck in this sort of cycle since Blue Sky never really got to develop its own identity or find huge success aside from its cash cow and by the time they started to make more interesting work, they were shut down due to Disney buying Fox. At some level, movies are a business and that is an understandable aspect, but the initial box office success is temporary, and the film itself is forever. Studios tend to forget that a lot of the time and forget that a movie has far more value if it ends up lasting. I guess sometimes a series will end up just being there for basic entertainment and at that level, there’s nothing wrong with that. At the end of the day though, a balance is needed between market focus and artistic drive when making a movie because if Ice Age is an example of leaning too hard into the former, then that work isn’t going to stick around for long.